[SML] College to High School

[John McAfee]

I second the frustrating “it depends” answer.  I spent 4 years as a high school TD and am in my 5th year as a college TD and I’m looking to go back to high school.  At the college level, I get a lot of non-majors who have jobs and kids and "real life” so the time and focus needed to learn how to build a platform with care is not there.  With high schoolers, yes,they were more immature, but when they were working with me, I found I had more of their attention.

There’s also the question of administrative support and budget and private vs. public (both college and high school).  Since high school is a smaller ecosystem, I think that there can be more administrative support and it is easier to explain how your job is not the traditional job.  That’s harder to do at the college level, I’ve found.  The support in high school will probably not translate into a larger budget, but you might have parental support (theatre boosters) that can help raise money and maybe some parents who can act as ATD if they are interested.

My experiences are also a little more apples to oranges because I was at a private boarding school for the high school and am at a state university (and not a flagship) now.

There’s a book called “The Perfect Stage Crew,” by John Kaluta and if you flip through that, I think it gives a pretty good idea of what an average set of expectations are for a high school TD in terms of student knowledge, participation, etc.

> On Apr 12, 2016, at 12:47 PM, gbierly via Stagecraft <stagecraft at theatrical.net> wrote:
> 
> It is really going to depend on your schools, both the college and HS and their programs.

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